8-17-21
The sky looked sick today. It wasn’t a particularly warm day, but there was a considerable breeze. Saw a very interesting bird on one of my breaks. It was surreal when the sky and the atmosphere and the general aura was a sickly, miasma green. Subtle and ominous.
Amelia scraped her knees at school today. More scars for the kid. She’s not having any hitting problems at school anymore and I’m grateful for that. Marie and I sat her down on Sunday and talked with her head on about it. Kids are hard to crack sometimes, but they’re always listening.
On the bed as a family I asked her questions. “Did you hit someone else? Did someone else hit you? Were you feeling mad? Are you telling the truth?” But I made sure to ask in order to understand, not to get an edge up. It was important that I understood how she felt to better interpret why she did what she did. Finally, a very important part is respecting honesty. I don’t want Amelia to do bad things, but I don’t want her to think telling me about them is bad.
In the end I want to promote open and honesty between my daughter and I. She is human and will make mistakes. A big part of parenting is making sure that they have the freedom to make mistakes without judgement or criticism. Making someone feel bad during the learning process means they’ll learn that trying gets them ridiculed.
Amelia did hit other kids. She said she was angry. She was angry because no one would play with her. No one would play with her because she’s new and very shy. So what do we do? Going forward we use our words and not our hands. When we’re angry we tell the teacher, and we can even tell our friends. We take a step back and approach the situation with the intention of seeking a solution, not exacerbating the issue.
We try, fail, learn, and try again.
-E.B.
Ed Boy 